A conceptual and taxonomic model to structure the field science-technology-society (or nature of science and technology, or whatever it is called)

Abstract

The specialists and researchers in science education agree that nature of science (NoS) is a constituent and relevant component of scientific (and technological) literacy that all citizens must acquire from basic education. This meritorious agreement contrasts with the multiple controversies existing about this issue, from its name to the didactic designs that more genuinely represent these contents in the educational curricula, which affects the research and the educational aspects. In recent years, controversy has centered on the so-called “consensus view”, which is considered a reductionism of the NoS meaning by critics, who propose broader conceptualizations. This study presents a new conceptualization of NoS, which assumes criticisms on the consensus view, and starts from Popper’s three-world model of science. The interactions and relationships between the three worlds, in a natural way, generate and justify a set of interdisciplinary meta-knowledge that give rise the NoS, where technology is explicitly included, so that the concept of science is extended to the techno-science and, therefore, the NoS is also re-conceptualized as the Nature of Science and Technology (NoS&T). This framework allows to elaborate a holistic scheme of four basic aspects, where multiple specific topics and sub-topics are organized in a functional, flexible and open taxonomy that gives structure to the conceptualization of NoS&T and that encompasses previous conceptualizations.